Apparently Larson Green wasn't happy with the Acer Iconia W3 giveaway and wanted to make the day even sweeter. Developers who attend the Build 2013 conference will receive a Microsoft Surface Pro with Type Cover.

Not a bad deal to try and drum up more development for Windows 8. We're sure developers will not disapprove of this move either. Stay tuned to our Build 2013 coverage for more news and coverage from the floor.

Why? They paid 2000$ to go to a conference...I think its more than fair that they get these treats.
Would you like to pay that much just to go watch something and leave empty handed? I don't think so ;)

They paid 2100$ + hotels and airline tickets for most. It's nice to get the gifts but it would be cheaper to just buy them and watch the sessions online, you get the same knowledge. The real value in the conference is networking. You get to meet a lot of people and that's worth the cost.
Of course, many attendees have their company pay for everything, and then it's a really sweet gift

Good for the devs and not fair to the ITPros. No free goodies for us on TechEd. Yes, we got a great price drop on RT and Pro but still, MS is favorizing devs a lot. TechEd tickets were not cheap either... #justsaying